In the United States, and probably in most other wealthy nations, the primary barriers to escaping poverty are cultural, not material. The poor may be oppressed, but it’s not the upper class that’s oppressing them. The cultural barriers are a real problem, but further subsidizing education isn’t the answer.

Nobody (74):
I do have doubts about the necessity of the long training period that doctors are required to undergo, and it’s probably true that the AMA, which like all unions was formed to suppress competition, is intentionally keeping the bar high to keep doctors’ salaries high. But the way to address that is to take away the AMA’s monopoly power, not to make doctors do menial labor based on some fantasy that it will make life more “fair.”

Sheelzebub (79):
Regarding real wages, this thread has already covered that ground. According to government data I posted above (post 33), real wages for all quintiles have gone up over the last few decades. And that’s before increases in nonmonetary benefits and government handouts, the latter of which, at least, is at an all-time high in real per-capita terms.

Failure of incomes to keep up with tuition is a more complicated issue. Education is in many ways a luxury good, so it’s reasonable to expect that people will spend more on it as their incomes rise.

A big part of the problem is simply that education is a service industry. Prices of manufactured goods tend to fall because productivity increases and you can make more with fewer people. But the only way to do that with education is to increase class size, which is generally frowned upon. As long as students expect smaller classes and professors expect their salaries to rise in real terms, then there’s really no way around it: Expenditures on instruction have to rise faster than inflation.

Actually, though, instruction expenditures have decreased as a percentage of total university expenditures. From 1976-2000, per-student expenditures at public universities increased from $15,999 to to $25,425 (in constant 2000 dollars). The main components of the $9,426 increase were research ($2772), instruction ($2416), administration ($2247), scholarships and fellowships ($971), and public service ($835). I’m not sure exactly what that last one entails.

From 1980-2000, federal and state funding of public colleges increased 26% in real, per-capita terms (the link gives total expenditures; you’ll have to go elsewhere for population and CPI data). Yes, tuition increased even faster, but it’s because college costs more and because enrollment rates are up (so the subsidies are spread more thinly), not because governments are cutting funding. Tuition still accounted for only 18% of public colleges’ funding in 2000 (as opposed to 13% in 1980). And I don’t think this even takes external scholarships into account, so the amount actually paid by students is even lower.

Whatever the reason for the increase in tuition costs, enrollment and graduation rates are in a long-term upward trend, so the increase isn’t keeping people from going to college.

Pre-GenX in the US, it wasn’t that common–in fact, in real dollars (adjusted for inflation, etc.), tuition for public and private colleges and universities was much lower. And real wages were actually higher (again, adjusted for inflation, cost of living, etc.)

Without denying that society benefits from equality, Brandon emphasizes the cost of alsis’s proposal in terms of lost surgery time. Without denying the cost of her proposal, alsis argues the benefit of her proposal in terms of increased equality.

Yeah, nobody. That’s it in a nutshell. It’s also why the discussion is doomed to not have any resolution, because my notion of what constitutes “value” or what IS most valuable in a given culture is never going to overlap all that much with the notions of folks like Brandon or Robert.

Yes, but in fairness, I intend to be a constitutional monarch, not a dictator. Sure, I can have people killed - but only one on one, and if it ticks off the nobility too much, I’ll be out on my ass.

Who is arguing that we live in a perfect meritocracy, and social circumstances (poverty, prejudice, chance, etc.) have no relevance on whether a person develops their natural aptitudes?

As far as I can tell, no one has argued for either position. Instead, I understand people to be arguing about the relative importance of natural ability and social circumstance. Without denying the role of social circumstance, Robert emphasizes the role of natural ability. Without denying the role of natural ability, alsis39.5 and Jake Squid emphasize the role of social circumstance.

I also understand alsis39.5 and Brandon Berg to engage in a different argument: Brandon argues that we have a shortage of surgeons but not janitors. Regardless of whether a person gets to be a surgeon through natural ability or social circumstance, Brandon argues, society benefits by maximizing the amount of surgery each surgeon performs. Alsis39.5 argues that society benefits from equality, too, and might benefit from a policy of having surgeons perform janitorial services for a while. Without denying that society benefits from equality, Brandon emphasizes the cost of alsis’s proposal in terms of lost surgery time. Without denying the cost of her proposal, alsis argues the benefit of her proposal in terms of increased equality.

I don’t know whether I see disagreement here, merely differences in emphasis.

Both Brandon and Robert suggest that the supply of surgeons is limited by the supply of natural ability (whether or not you label that ability “IQ”). But alsis, Jake, and the Zenmasterw express some skepticism. Is the natural ability of surgeons really so rare?

I wonder, too. Specifically, what determines the number of people admitted to med school (or to surgery residencies)? Does the number fluctuate depending on the qualifications of the applicant pool? Or is it more or less fixed, governed by administrative capacities and/or budget? If the latter is true, then I start to get suspicious.

Consider pharmacists: Why are they so rare? Sure, once upon a time a pharmacist had to know how to mix medicines, but today they’re just glorified vending machines. In fact, some clinics are installing vending machines to dispense their most commonly-prescribed prescription drugs. (You get a code with your prescription that you type into the machine.) The fact that pharmacists have a monopoly on dispensing prescription drugs looks like a scam to me.

As an aside, Jake tells Robert that

Calling me a communist is nearly as accurate as calling you a fascist.

Maybe Jake is unaware of Robert’s prior solicitation of support for his plans for world domination. Or maybe Jake is aware. Who knows, comrade? :-)

Most people don’t test out as 160s and 60s. Most folks fall within a far slimmer range of IQs. Some of these folks become doctors, and some janitors.

If you really think that only people with IQs of 160 are doctor material, then you have unreasonably high expectations. We wouldn’t be able to meet the needs of folks requiring treatment for strep throat if that were the case, let alone get all these heart surgeries you keep bringing up performed.

This assumption that doctors and other proffesionals have some sort of magical aptitude that cannot be taught is tiresome.

Sure IQ is great for distinguishing a genius from a moron. But so are a host of other methods. But I don’t think that you are really saying that you have to have an IQ of 160 (or even 120) to be a medical doctor. I’ll agree that if you consistently score below 60, you probably don’t have what it takes. But, then again, I doubt that most janitorial workers have sub-60 IQs - I doubt that you think that, either.

But again, the problem w/ IQ tests is that in the space of a year people have been known to score between 80 & 120 (w/o the direction necessarily being up). For example. Score 105 in January, score 80 in July & score 120 in November. Is that person capable of being a doctor? We don’t know. IQ testing hasn’t told us anything about how smart or capable that person is.

The thing is, even if you believe in IQ as valid & reliable, it doesn’t take a genius to be a medical doctor. What becoming a medical doctor does require is opportunity, interest & something around average intelligence (what’s that IQ at these days? 85? 100?). What janitorial workers lack, for the most part, that medical doctors have is opportunity. And that is not an innate skill.

That is to say, even if janitorial workers have, on average, a lower IQ (or even less intelligence) than medical doctors, it is not enough of a difference, on average, to say that janitorial workers are not capable of being medical doctors.

Not to mention that being smart doesn’t necessarily make one capable of being a medical doctor - but that is a different discussion entirely.

Uh huh. And yet despite all of IQs flaws (which are real), a guy with an IQ of 160 tends to be really smart and a guy with an IQ of 60 tends to have trouble figuring out which bus to take. Both are human beings, both are possessed of real dignity, both are spiritually equal before the Lord their God.

One of them is capable of being educated into a surgeon, and the other is not.

You may dispute this; I’m not going to argue with you about it. Good luck with organizing your society.

Take a look at the history of the Soviet economy some time. They had a real problem with acknowledging that some people were just more important - more irreplaceable - in organizing an economic system than others were, and in letting that reality express itself.

But again, if you don’t want to believe it, that’s cool. Don’t want to fight about it.

IQ? IQ isn’t really a useful measurement. IQ isn’t even a consistent measure of whatever it is measuring. IQ tests have a clear cultural/class bias. IQ isn’t something that a person possesses, or so I think. IQ is an attempt, a poor one, to measure intelligence. I don’t believe that IQ has much to do with whether or not one is capable of being a medical doctor. Using IQ as a measure of ability is, at the most charitable, problematic.

But the idea you’re promulgating is, in fact, one of the key elements in the communist inability to make an economic system work.

I disagree with that. The key factor in the inability to have a communist economy is that communism is a utopia in which all people believe exactly alike - unlike, say, socialism or capitalism or feudalism in which diversity of economic beliefs is tolerable without destroying the system.

What you’re saying is that you read my statement as “all people are equal in all ways,” and that clearly isn’t what I wrote. Nor is that a necessary element of communism, as I understand it. Communism is not predicated on all people having equal ability - not anywhere that I have read.

But the idea you’re promulgating is, in fact, one of the key elements in the communist inability to make an economic system work.

The innate ability that all medical doctors have that the vast majority of janitorial workers are missing is the complex of cognitive skills collectivelly referenceable as “IQ”. (Well, the janitorial workers don’t not HAVE IQ. They just have collectively a much lower median and mean. Along with plenty of outliers on the right-hand side of the curve, of course.)

You’re right, I can’t point to a national economy and call it “communist”. Similarly, I cannot point to any castles built on top of clouds. There’s a reason for that.

Secondly, you (once again) twist my words. I didn’t say that everybody is equal. Read what I wrote again.

… medical doctors don’t have any special innate skills that janitorial workers are lacking.

Can you see the difference between the two statements?

Thirdly, I don’t think that you can name a single economy on a national level that could properly be referred to as “communist.”

Fourthly, you provide no counter argument. No suggestion of an innate ability that all medical doctors have that the vast majority of janitorial workers are missing. All you can do is shout, “Communist! Loser! Communism doesn’t work.”

If you don’t have anything to add other than to call people names or improperly label them with what amounts to an insult in our society, shut up. Calling me a communist is nearly as accurate as calling you a fascist.

Ladies and gentlemen, the explanation for crumbled communist economies throughout time and space, in one sentence.

“Everyone has to equal. It says so, right here on the label!”

Brandon, I apologize for the spots where I confused your posts with Ron’s, or vice versa.

And I’m still impressed at how thoroughly a lot of the disparaging remarks about manual wage labor echo the customary disparaging remarks made about the SAH wife/mother’s typical unpaid “women’s work.” I shouldn’t be, but I am.

So, if we were to follow alsis’ preferred economic path perhaps there enough janitorial workers who would use the newly freed up time & the opportunity that would be provided in her plan to work their way through medical school, become heart surgeons & avoid any possible shortfall in availability of heart surgery.

If you can get over your amazement at the astounding concept that there isn’t anything superior (relative to the rest of the human race) about the potential of medical doctors, that is.

As for economics, like so much else, some of it seems reasonable, and much of it seems like inane babble utterly disconnected from day-to-day human concerns. I seem to recall Krugman, the supposed compassionate lefty voice on the spectrum, getting all ga-ga over the internet bubble and carrying on as if it represented the zenith of modern society. No thanks. There is such a thing as being so educated that you don’t know diddly.

That’d be Ron again. I don’t have any children.

Which has what to do, exactly, to alter the necessity of having somebody sweep the floors ?

Marginal utility. People qualified to perform surgery are rare, and people qualified to sweep floors are abundant, so the marginal utility of an additional surgeon is much greater than the marginal utility of an additional floor-sweeper.

To put it another way, the availability of qualified surgeons is the limiting factor in determining how much surgery gets done. There are no unemployed surgeons. And there are no surgeons delivering pizzas. Everyone who’s qualified to do surgery is either employed as a surgeon or retired. And most surgeons in the former group are already working overtime. So if a surgeon quits, the hospital can’t replace him except by hiring a surgeon away from another hospital. One way or another, fewer people get the operations they need.

But what happens if the guy who cleans the operating room quits? Do you think the hospital staff just throws up their arms and says, “Well, darn! We can’t do surgeries in a dirty operating room! We’re just going to have to fire Dr. Jones!”? Of course not. Before they stop doing surgeries, they’ll hire any one of the many millions of people who are qualified to clean operating rooms but aren’t currently doing so.

When a surgeon quits, fewer operations get done, and more people die (or suffer whatever consequences follow from not getting that particular operation done). When a floor-sweeper quits, it really doesn’t matter all that much, because virtually anyone can do his job.

A good economics textbook should give you the tools to figure this stuff out yourself—or at least to understand where I’m coming from—and it’s required reading for anyone who wants to remake the world. Even the ones by left-wingers (by economist standards) like Stiglitz and Krugman should be okay.

A) I certainly hope that you are more compassionate toward strangers than you are to your online aquaintances

and

B) Sometimes it seems a real shame that blogs don’t come with laugh tracks.

Um, no. Strangers, who I will never meet, see, or interact with.